Chapter 20
Min-Ji
I had never wanted to reach out and crawl into Corin’s lap as badly as I did right then.
I held back because I knew that’s what he wanted me to do, but it felt wrong.
He’d looked so happy moments ago, relaxed in ways I hadn’t ever seen him.
Now, he was sitting ramrod straight, his scales whispering as they rattled along his spine with his unease.
I didn’t have to guess to know what had set this off: the Queen.
Though my instincts shouted at me to reach out and touch him, to offer him silent support, I scooted away instead.
My chest felt heavy as I did, and I felt tiny under the gaze of the pretty Naga teacher.
Her golden eyes felt disapproving, like I’d done the wrong thing. I knew that; it felt wrong to me, too.
The two Thunder Rock Naga women paused on the gangplank as they exited the medical ship and gazed out over the camp.
The younger female had so many scars all over her arms and chest that I wondered if she’d been in a paper shredder.
She looked fierce, proud, and utterly fearless.
But it was the Queen herself who struck fear inside my chest. Her face was pulled into the most vicious snarl I’d ever seen, and I felt tiny as a bug when her gaze landed on me—like dirt beneath her tail when she started to approach.
The Thunder Rock Queen was big and imposing, wider across the shoulders than her daughter, and definitely much stockier than Avrish.
She looked like she could squash my head in her fist like a grape; her expression said she was planning to do it too.
Corin rose and moved between me and the approaching thundercloud, his fists balled at his sides.
My heart went out to him, knowing how that woman had altered the course of his life.
She had held power over him that she had not deserved and had mistreated in the worst way.
Corin looked angry rather than afraid, and that anger struck a chord inside me. Yeah, that was the right response. Screw her! She had no right to this. When she opened her mouth and spewed her vile words, it only stoked the flames.
“Why are there humans here? I came here to warn you of their threat! I want them removed or isolated!” she shouted and flung out a claw to point my way.
“Don’t just stand there, protecting that vermin, Corin.
Remove her.” It was as if the direct order made him snap, jerking him out of his silent, simmering rage and bringing all that anger fully to the surface—years of bottled-up rage against her mistreatment, resentment over what she’d made him lose. But it wasn’t any of that he expressed.
“Do NOT talk to my mate that way, Asizza!” Corin growled in the deadliest, most bone-rattling sound I’d ever heard him make.
His tail snapped out and curled around my middle, sigils flaring brightly to life for everyone to see.
My stomach swooped, my anger vanishing like snow before the sun from the shock of this rapid turn of events.
Never in my wildest dreams had I expected Corin to declare me his this loudly, and in front of the person he feared the most.
The Queen responded with an outraged yowling sound, her claws raising as she lurched forward.
I thought she was going to attack me, but she reined herself in at the last moment, halting a dozen feet away from Corin, fire spitting from her eyes and her chest heaving.
The angry Queen didn’t get quite the response she was looking for.
Behind me, Avrish ushered the young Naga away, helped by Altare, whom I hadn’t even realized was present.
When he curled his tail around hers just as they ducked with their students into the nearest shuttle, his sigils lit up.
That left us without the prying ears of children, but dozens of adults had slithered out from their traveling homes and research labs to witness what was going on.
On the gangplank of the medical ship, the three elders who had taken Reid into their care appeared.
They lined up in a neat row, arms crossed, expressions stern.
Even though I hadn’t done anything wrong, I still felt called out.
They had that stern headmaster thing going on right now, and it was almost instinct to go over and apologize.
Of course, the Queen just glanced over her shoulder and then hissed with more anger; she wasn’t intimidated.
“Mate?” the Queen hissed. “You mated that… creature?” It was completely quiet in the clearing.
Nobody said anything; they just watched.
The Naga female seemed to shake herself out of the gripping rage from a moment ago and turned on the haughty and disdainful coolness now.
“Out of all my hunters, I expected much better from you, Corin.”
“Yeah?” Corin drawled. The loop of his tail pushed more tightly against my hip.
Suddenly, I found myself tumbling forward until my hands collided with his side.
He immediately wrapped his arm around my shoulders.
“You expected me to be your lover, your plaything, until you grew tired of me. You’re a sick female, lusting after your son’s friend when I was only a youngling.
It is you who forbade me from returning to my studies here because I refused your advances.
I have nothing to be ashamed of. You, though? ”
The Queen blanched, flinching back before she straightened her spine and began uttering all kinds of denials.
It wasn’t my imagination that more than one expression in the crowd of onlookers had turned disapproving—not to Corin, but to the Queen.
Corin wasn’t done either, and I was so proud of him for facing his worst fear, for standing up to this bitch.
Honestly, being proclaimed his mate so publicly was also like a dream come true, and it was completely unexpected.
“You’re a terrible female, Asizza, and a terrible Queen, not deserving of that title.
I am done fearing you, and I am done letting you control any aspect of my life.
Min-Ji is my mate, and I love her—she is the best thing that has ever happened to me.
You will not take that from me.” It felt like my face was on fire by the time Corin finished his declaration, but I discovered I could blush even harder when he swept me up with his tail and claimed my mouth with his.
The Naga didn’t kiss, so this was a double shock to everyone watching.
I heard hissing, surprised gasps, and an utterly furious growl, followed by more angry demands from the spurned Queen.
Corin ignored it all, and with his mouth on mine, I soon forgot about our audience.
The taste of him was home—spicy and sweet.
His split tongue tangled with mine, mimicking all kinds of naughty things.
I felt like a puddle in his powerful embrace, all noodle legs and molten core.
He loved me; he said that! That wasn’t something Naga normally declared either, but he’d embraced all the human customs for me.
I was so happy right now that I felt like I might burst. Tears clung to my lashes and trickled down my cheeks.
My heart pounded in my chest, and I felt like I could linger in that moment forever.
Cling to Corin’s wide shoulders, his mouth on mine, and his arms to shelter me.
“Ahum,” a voice, low and rough, broke into the moment.
“Corin, let your female breathe. She’s leaking.
” Corin instantly yanked his head back, and I gasped, my fingers clinging to the back of his neck as if I had the strength to pull him back to me.
His silver eyes were glowing as they roved over my cheeks, but while the voice sounded mildly alarmed, Corin didn’t spook at my tears.
He knew what they were by now, and it made him grin.
“Nothing to worry about, Shaman Altare. Humans cry when they are sad, or when they are very happy. Isn’t that right, mate?
” How I’d longed to hear him call me that, and now he’d done it so many times already, in front of others.
Yeah, happiness was right. I nodded, a smile spreading on my face to answer the one on his.
“Very happy,” I said, my voice embarrassingly husky.
It made Corin groan, and his arms tightened around me, the heat of his hard cock pressing eagerly against my belly.
It was the naughtiest thing I’d ever experienced, the press of his extruding erection against me, hidden only by my body from the prying eyes of one of his former mentors.
“Good. Congratulations on your mating,” the male, Altare, said.
I was pretty sure now, now that I was no longer caught up in Corin’s kiss, that this was the guy who had helped Avrish with the Naga youngling a moment ago.
Avrish’s mate. Altare was also the guy whom Corin had declared to be a loner who liked his privacy, which explained why he parked his shuttle all the way near the trees.
He was a hard-looking red male, possibly from Bitter Storm once, but his hair had streaked white, leaving some locks looking incongruously pink.
“You called her by name,” he said, jabbing a claw in the direction of the medical ship.
“That’s a grave insult, my boy.” Ah, it had seemed odd that everyone, even Corin, always called her ‘Queen,’ and now he’d called her Asizza twice.
I didn’t even know Queens still had names.
They were only ever referred to as Queen or with their Clan name added.
“She deserved it,” Corin hissed. “Funny how she seemed so much larger than life in my memory, but here… today. She was nothing to me. Nothing.” He hissed the last word with a deep lilt of satisfaction and flicked his eyes from his stoic mentor back to me.
They glowed with warmth and happiness, lightened from a darkness he’d been carrying for far too long.
“I’m sorry, Min-Ji. I should have known that we would be stronger together. Always stronger together.”